Obama juggernaut continues--18K donations since the end of the first quarter (90% from new donors)

How long before a slew of hitjobs against Obama? Their target is Edwards right now but the larger threat to those forces comes from Obama at this stage.

From the Obama campaign:

Dear, draft_mario_cuomo

You may have heard the reports that we had an even bigger first quarter fundraising report than we expected.

After everything was counted and double-checked, we reported to the Federal Election Committee yesterday that an astonishing 104,000 donors gave over 25 million dollars to the campaign.

But the real story is what's happened since the first news broke of our tremendous response.

In the two weeks since the end of the first quarter, over 18,000 people have donated to the campaign -- over 90% of them for the first time.

With the news of our historic start, the Washington chattering class is nervous. Those invested in the status quo have a hard time grasping that a movement made up of people who want a new kind of politics can actually change things.

Now's the time for every person who supports Barack Obama to make one thing perfectly clear: we're here, we're serious about change, and we're going to be heard.

When people come together one by one, astounding things can happen. This is just the beginning. We can continue to grow this movement, but it's up to you.

Will you become the next person to be counted by making a donation today?

http://www.barackobama.com/becounted

Here's another indication that our movement continues to reach new people every day: so far in April, over 15,000 people have donated to the campaign over the Internet -- and for more than 13,500 of them, this was their first donation to the campaign.

It's not just happening online. Our movement continues to grow everywhere: two days ago, over 20,000 people rallied with Barack in Atlanta, Georgia, the largest political rally in that city’s history.

People like you are proving that no matter what any pundit says, this campaign isn't about what happened -- it's about what's going to happen.

More people are going to be involved than ever before.

People like you will have more power over the process than ever before.

And, if we succeed, we're going to elect a president who answers to the American people for a change.

You can make it happen by stepping up to be counted now:

http://www.barackobama.com/becounted

We've seen what happens when the will of the people is swept aside.

Corruption and incompetence paralyze our government, America's ability to lead the world is diminished, and the fundamental fairness of our society diminishes to benefit the privileged few.

We need a movement of ordinary people to elect our next president.

Only by electing a president accountable to no one but the people will we restore America's moral leadership in the world and create a government that works for all of us.

Some people don't believe it can be done. But you're showing them the way.

Thank you.

Yours sincerely,
David

David Plouffe
Campaign Manager
Obama for America

:sarcasm:

Edwards is an easy target - he's flip-flopped on most (all?) major positions. Obama seems fairly consistent, at least from what I can tell.

Example please?

He was plain-spokenly against the IWR when Congress voted for it. No equivocating, no triangulating.

poverty? or really anything. What does he want to accomplish as President besides being symbolic

I need to research Obama quite a bit more - but assuming that you're correct, I guess we'll have to see. But he does not seem to triangulate of flip-flop, which does differentiate him from the other front-runners.

He's listening to Americans first, and selling himself as a true agent of change.

The specifics are coming quite soon, I'm sure.

He decided to run for President much later than Edwards who has given this time and thought. To his detriment, Obama didn't give this much thought before getting in, and he hasn't yet enunciated why he wants to be President and what he wants to accomplish. Obama is a great speaker and a great symbol, but he's not fleshed out yet.

That is simultaneously impressive and disturbing. Without people knowing what he intends to do--and how he intends to do it, he has generated a groundswell of support.

Aside from Iraq, on what can he be accused of flip-flopping? Even on Iraq who is "pure"? You can't be against the war before you vote to fund it.

He voted for most job-obliterating 'free' trade bills, as well as both no-predatory-lender-left-behind bankruptcy bills.

Shame.

been targeting Obama relentlessly for the past 2 weeks.

The guy is much more stronger of a candidate than what most people thought. His message is being heard all over America, and people are responding.

Started with the weak health care forum performance in Vegas and snowballed fom there. By the end of it, he was a substance-free, not-ready-for-prime-time clueless neophyte ready to be consigned to the distbin of history....Then the 1Q fund-raising report came out and the media, overly impressed as they are with money, changed their tone.

I'm expecting another offensive soon. For now, I am more than happy to see the media occupied elsewhere.

all this guy has done his whole professional life is think about politics, programs and people. In two years in the Senate he has been the primary sponsor of over 150 bills and resolutions covering a broad range of domestic and foreign issues. And then he went home at night and wrote The Audacity of Hope.

I'm looking forward to the debates. I think he'll do well, too.

What he has been criticized for is being vague and not offering much in the way of policy proposals. He will do well in the debates but as he begins filling in the blanks his appeal may decline (although I doubt it will decline substantially). Right now he is a blank slate that everyone can project their hopes onto.

but I don't think he's come close to stating why he wants to be President or what he hopes to accomplish

Here are some good backgrounders:

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/sen.-barack-obama-tries-to-flesh-out-his-record-with-an-election-fraud-bill-2007-02-01.html

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16640635/

Here's a good piece on his legislative style and his approach to bi-partisanship:

<I do follow legislation, at least on some issues, and I have been surprised by how often Senator Obama turns up, sponsoring or co-sponsoring really good legislation on some topic that isn't wildly sexy, but does matter. His bills tend to have the following features: they are good and thoughtful bills that try to solve real problems; they are in general not terribly flashy; and they tend to focus on achieving solutions acceptable to all concerned, not by compromising on principle, but by genuinely trying to craft a solution that everyone can get behind.

His legislation is often proposed with Republican co-sponsorship, which brings me to another point: he is bipartisan in a good way. According to me, bad bipartisanship is the kind practiced by Joe Lieberman. Bad bipartisans are so eager to establish credentials for moderation and reasonableness that they go out of their way to criticize their (supposed) ideological allies and praise their (supposed) opponents. They also compromise on principle, and when their opponents don't reciprocate, they compromise some more, until over time their positions become indistinguishable from those on the other side.

This isn't what Obama does. Obama tries to find people, both Democrats and Republicans, who actually care about a particular issue enough to try to get the policy right, and then he works with them. This does not involve compromising on principle. It does, however, involve preferring getting legislation passed to having a spectacular battle. (This is especially true when one is in the minority party, especially in this Senate: the chances that Obama's bills will actually become law increase dramatically when he has Republican co-sponsors.)>

http://dsadevil.blogspot.com/2006/10/obamas-record.html

Here's an insight into why you aren't seeing full-blown plans right now, and why the emphasis is on Obama the person, not Obama and his detailed blueprints:

<After the consecutive presidential losses of Al Gore and John Kerry, patrician candidates who ran ill-fitting “people versus the powerful” campaigns designed for them by the consultant Bob Shrum, many Democrats began to suspect that part of what was wrong with the party was its formulaic consultants. The party has suffered, Axelrod says, from a “Wizard of Oz syndrome among Washington political consultants who tend to come to candidates and say: I have the stone tablets! You do what I say, and you will get elected. And they fit their candidates into their rubric.”

Axelrod’s is a less grand, postideological approach, and his campaigns are rooted less in issues than in the particulars of his candidate’s life. For him, running campaigns hitched to personality rather than ideology is a way of reclaiming fleeting authenticity. It is also, more and more, the way of the Democratic Party. Its 2006 Congressional campaign strategy — run by Axelrod’s close friend Emanuel, with the Chicago consultant acting as principal sounding board — did not depend on any great idea of where the party ought to go, like the last political cataclysm, Newt Gingrich’s 1994 House “revolution.” As they have reclaimed power, the Democrats have done so not by moving appreciably to the left or the right; rather, they have done so by allowing their candidates to move in both directions at once. “What David is basically doing — and this is somewhat new for Democrats — isn’t trying to figure out how to sell policies,” says the Democratic media consultant Saul Shorr. “It’s a matter of personality. How do we sell leadership?”>

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/01/magazine/01axelrod.t.html?ex=1177041600&en=01a5964b6e51e63f&ei=5070

What about proposals? Voting for president should not be a faith-based initiative. Candidates should say what they intend to do--and how they intend to do it.

Axlerod is selling personalities, not ideas. That is not a good thing. The Founding Fathers did not want a democracy of dueling one page biographical ads.

Obama got into the race late so he has a legitimate excuse for being vague on everything. If he continues this, though, then people are going to start asking "Where's the beef?". The debates will be difficult for him if he remains this way.

and you glom onto the style point.

Whatever...More from Axelrod:

<David Axelrod, the senator's lead strategist, said Obama would put forth his ideas on a range of issues in due course. Axelrod said Obama would "be making a series of policy speeches this month, next month, and there will be debates." He added that the clamor for specifics would "end up being moot by the time this campaign is over."

"I think the political community has a sense that every day is election day, and every day is the last day of the campaign, and of course that isn't true," Axelrod said.>

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-obama5apr05,1,6053549.story?coll=la-headlines-politics

As I said earlier, he deserves time to come up with policy proposals since he entered the race recently while Edwards has been running for president since 2003 and HRC since 2000. Candidates like HRC, though, have no excuse for a lack of substance. She has no plan for universal health care, no plan for Iraq, etc.

the first quarter and just donated again. I am so excited to see so many who have donated since.